


Trad Wife in an Ushanka

by ckrev



Category: The Centricide (Webseries)
Genre: Antisemitism, Developing Relationship, Homophobic Language, INGSOC references, Internalized Homophobia, James is terminally online on /pol/, Joseph is a shredded lumberjack, M/M, Russian food, Semi-crackfic, Sexual Repression, State mandated partner, Totalitarian regime, coming to terms with sexuality, repressed homosexuality, slight domestic fluff
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-06-22
Updated: 2020-07-09
Packaged: 2021-03-04 02:21:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 3,319
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24756220
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ckrev/pseuds/ckrev
Summary: Once reached the age of 18, every man and every woman is assigned a partner with which to spend the rest of their lives, as per the Party's ambition to breed a nation of strong, white citizens united in the chaste union of monogamous wedlock.James is thrilled to further the Party's traditions, but the Ministry will designate him a rather unconventional 'wife'.
Relationships: Authright/Authleft, Commie/Nazi, tankie/nazi
Comments: 26
Kudos: 78





	1. Greetings, citizen.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Expect slurs, man's a nazi.

The Party's practices were peculiar. Those deeply rooted in its customs swore by the efficiency of its methods, and the extreme accuracy of the Party's all-knowing overseeing eye; conversely, those who dared to disagree with the methods proposed by the Big Brother seemed to have now disappeared, almost becoming an extinct species. It was purely coincidental for dissenters to immediately fall prey to waves of suicidal inclinations, with some killing themselves, and others disappearing under obscure circumstances mere days later. 

For a young white man like James Reichmanger, nothing of this mattered. Finally being 18 only meant two things worthy of mention: One, he was now allowed to settle in an apartment of his own, and two, he would soon receive the white, state-mandated trad wife he had been promised since his fifteenth birthday. Today, at 18:30 precisely, the wait will be over.

James felt the warmth of delight rushing to his cheeks, as he took a sharp inhale and laid carelessly on the bed beneath him. He suffocated a giggle at the thought of holding hands with a girl for the first time; in fact, it had been years since he had even talked to one.

_'Girls are scary.'_

He had always been quite a lot more comfortable spending time with boys, and whether it was because of his misogyny or something else, he remained thoroughly captivated by the concept of masculinity. He was pretty scrawny himself, not to mention the shortest among his friend group. He rolled on his side, pressing his cheek hard against the blue-tinted pillow, and caught a glimpse of the clock on the opposite side of his room.

17:23.

He was finally able to drag himself out of the undone bed, stumbling on his feet once they touched the ground trashed with cans of Monster and Mountain Dew. The mirror near the door allowed him to get a full glance of his messy hair and bag-laden eyes, accentuated by the paleness of his skin. He had slept with his clothes on, and now his dress shirt was crowded by tiny, annoying wrinkles.

He huffed, pushing the door of his room open.

* * *

The train ride to the Ministry of Family took longer than James expected. 45 minutes spent crammed with other thirty people into what he considered a metal box travelling at dangerously high speed. Efficient, uncomfortable, and freezing cold; Just like the Party. The tired faces of the other passengers blended seamlessly into the dullness of the sky, now starting to catch the tints of the incoming evening. James tortured himself by stabbing the palms of his hands with his nails, yet keeping his appearance as indifferent as possible; it would've been a shame if anyone on that damned train figured out that such a simple duty required of him by the Party had thrown him in the deepest of his recent emotional spirals.

At 18:18, he got off.

The Ministry of Family was visible from miles away. The main building was a magnetizing visual burden on all its visitors, a monolithic concrete building reminiscent of Brutalist architecture. The interiors were even worse. James's heel clattered on the barebone concrete of the pavement, echoing around the walls. His pace was brisk enough to make him appear assertive, but not enough to reveal his excitement. He was glad not many people were present, but that also meant all his little theatrical acts meant to convince bystanders of his authority as a man had been futile. He slowed down, scanning the room. Only 5 people, two of whom, judging by the colour of their uniform, were operators in the public entrance departments of the Ministry.

There was a desk in the eastern side of the room, lost in the emptiness of that space; the woman sitting behind the typewriter had been gawking at James since he'd walked through the entrance. A small screen discreetly laid on the side offered a panoramic of the recordings of the tens of cameras polluting the nearby area. James took notice of that.

"Excuse me, lovely lady," He began. "I recently reached the legal age, and I'm here to collect my assigned partner." He cracked a knowing smile, his eyebrow lifting just barely.

She batted her eyelids, her face not moving by not even a millimetre.

"Understood. Third southwestern hallway. Then door with the golden plaque."

"Uh, thanks." _Jesus fucking Christ, so goddamn obnoxious._

Nonetheless, he promptly followed her instructions. The door with the plaque was there, though it definitely wasn't plated in real gold. He got in, and not much to his surprise the looked even barer than the others. A couple more people were standing there talking, both of whom seemed to be around his age. He didn't mind them all that much and went back to brooding in his thoughts after leaning against the nearest wall.

 _'Okay, this is it. I'm doing it, I'm almost there. What time is it? Fuck. 18:32. It's okay, it's only two minutes. Relax. She should already be in here. Uh..."_ He nervously scanned the room for a hint of her presence, his eyes bouncing around the off-white walls around him, and landing on the two strangers standing there. He looked closer, squinting his eyes in annoyance. The shortest of two was the only one wearing the Ministry's uniform. The other man, distinctly taller, was wearing a curious fur hat with flaps on the sides. He stood with his back facing James, allowing him to get a good view of the broadness of his shoulders.

_What if..._

_Oh, God._

_Holy fucking shit._

"Greetings citizen. I am here to provide the final instructions for the optimal care of your partner." The operator spoke softly, once he had gotten close enough to James.

_There's no way._

"I'm, uh, I'm here for my wife." Cut short James, snapping out of his brooding.

"Certainly. May I get your name and Identification Number?" 

_No, no, no, no._

"It's, uhm, James. James Reichmanger. JR2040007."

"Understood," The operator scribbled something on his notepad. "I have the pleasure to introduce you to your partner." The operator hesitated, lightly tapping the shoulder of the man beside him, who turned around to face the shaking white boy fidgeting with the hem of his hat. 

James was speechless. His eyes stared blankly at his new 'wife', unable to muster any kind of coherent sentence. He appeared even broader than before. James's eyes trailed at the man's jawline, so defined it could've as well have been used as a blade for a guillotine. Tan skin, a slightly hooked nose, and two mahogany eyes were staring back at him. James held his breath once he realized he could even see the outline of the muscles on his chest. He'd never seen a man this charming before. 

With his mouth gaping, it wasn't long before his daze turned to anger. His eyebrows furrowed, struggling to force the words out of his mouth. 

"You're telling me this...this faggot..." He began, his nostrils flaring after he began breathing disorderedly. "Is supposed to be...my beautiful fucking wife...?!" He vehemently pointed an accusatory finger at the taller man, shaking in a fit of rage and disbelief.

"Your partner, indeed." The operator glanced back at the taller man, nodding, completely unfazed by James's reaction. "Thank you for forwarding the will of the Party, valued citizen."

Unceremoniously, the operator abandoned the room at a swift pace.

James was left to seethe, clenching his whole body and finally releasing his frustration by punching the area in the wall in front of him, which promptly collapsed into a hole leaving behind a trail of dust and paint fragments. He fell on his knees, pressing his face against his arms and wall, sobbing.

"I-I was supposed to b-be with one... one of those fucking femoids..." He whined, gritting his teeth. "Not...this...not with that...that t-thing."

He suddenly felt the warmth of someone's hand caressing his shoulder. He instinctively opened his eyes, only to be confronted with the mildly bewitching presence of his government-assigned partner holding him in a hesitant hug.

"What...the fuck are you doing..?!" He protested, too weak to subtract from his partner's hold. "Go away, faggot." His voice cracked, trying to keep up his masculine appearances.

"You can call me Joseph, instead."

James stayed silent, exhaling a shaky breath against the other's shoulder.

"It's alright..." Joseph tightened the grip against the other's body once he felt James's head resting against his chest. He finally calmed down. "That's better. Breathe."

_'It shouldn't feel like this. I'm not supposed to feel like this. Am I a tranny? I'll fucking kill myself, I don't want to be a faggot.'_

"...let's go home."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Repressed nazi is best nazi.


	2. Sacrifices for the Greater Good

James discovered many things about himself on the train ride home. Sitting opposite to him and careful not to get too close, the White Nationalist made it abundantly clear that his previous display of vulnerability was in no way related to the fact he'd spent the majority of his teens repressing impulses he considered 'unnatural'.

"I know there's something up in the Family Ministry. I know it. They're trying to corrupt our traditional family values in exchange for the weaker, degenerate, sodomite 'marriages'."

Joseph listened patiently to James's ranting, only occasionally letting out a soft hum of approval. With his tall figure leaning against the yellowed windows of the compartment, he had to look downwards a fair bit to be able to look at James in the eyes, which had been uncomfortably sitting down for the entire duration of their ride.

"If only I could stuff them all in the gas chambers, then maybe the West would have a chance to conserve its supremacy over those... _Untermenschen._ " He spat on the floor between his feet, glaring up to meet Joseph's careful stare. He lazily pulled himself straight on his seat, resting his arms on the top of the numerous empty seats around him. 

"How come you're so quiet, huh?" 

"A good wife must know when to be quiet, and listen to the man when he's speaking." Replied Joseph with a half-smile, and a remarkably gentle voice.

"Wife?! You are no wife of mine, you faggot." He sneered, crossing his arms in front of his chest. "You're a man, and men can't be wives."

"Do you not consider me your wife?"

"I...don't. Of course I don't." His voice staggered. "Why the fuck would I?"

"You allowed the operator at the Ministry to let us get married." 

"It's not like I had any other choice. You cuck seriously think the Party would've let me walk out of that shithole of a building without someone as my legal spouse?" 

"It is not my place to speak, but I would've suggested you to contest the pairing; the AI used by the Party is efficient but not impec-"

"Shut up! Shut the fuck up. Close your goddamn mouth and know your place." He immediately felt the weight of half a dozen pairs of eyes pointed towards him, eagerly observing from every angle of the train. He'd raised his voice once again, fuck. While avoiding every passenger's stare, he gestured Joseph to follow him onto the platform once the train had reached his destination.

James wasn't in the mood to apologize, not even once the doors on the train had closed, separating him from the herd of eagerly watching spectators. He dug his hands in his pockets, clenching his fist around the familiar shape of his house keys. He didn't even bother to look at Joseph in the eyes anymore, too embarrassed to do so. 

"It's cold here," James commented offhandedly, trying to ease the pressure between the two. "My apartment is not far." 

"Sure, I'm delighted to have the possibility to spend some time at your residence." Despite his eagerness, Joseph appeared to be perfectly comfortable, even dressed as lightly as he was. James couldn't help but notice the little crimson star adorning the front of his ushanka, dangling precariously at the rhythm of Joseph's walk. 

* * *

James's apartment was exactly as messy as he had left it. Now sunk in the blackness of the night, his room might've as well have belonged to a feral animal. He never bothered to clean now that he was on a place of his own, and the grime building up on the floor certainly didn't help the fact that every room of the apartment was drenched in the nauseating smell of cigarettes and tobacco. Once they stepped foot inside, James immediately abandoned himself on the greyish couch in the living room, kicking the boots off his feet, letting them land on the other side of the apartment.

Joseph didn't feel intimidated by the presence of James in the slightest, but now having to deal with him in an environment that so closely resembled his character seemed to have begun to have an influence on him. No books, no furnished kitchen, and blinds rigorously closed. It was impossible to not remain fascinated by the utter quantity of posters littering his walls, most of them in black and white, picturing slogans and caricatures that might've been more fit in the propaganda section at a Holocaust memorial museum.

"Uh...James? What do they mean by 'gas the kik-'"

"It's the jews, Joseph. It's always them." He exhaled, annoyed, tapping the bridge of his nose.

Joseph looked at him puzzledly, shrugging. He went back to examining the odd choice in the decoration of his apartment. He absentmindedly took off his suit jacket, dropping it on a nearby chair. He was left wearing a surprisingly tight black shirt, though he didn't bother taking off his ushanka. James clenched his jaw, discreetly admiring the curve of Joseph's biceps contracting under that layer of cloth. He pretended to be looking at the posters on the wall, sporadically taking a peek at the man in front of him.

Joseph's pose stiffened when he caught James staring at him with the tail of his eye. He hesitated to say anything at that moment, but his confidence returned soon after once he remembered the type of man he was dealing with.

"...it's okay." He began saying, turning back to face James. "You don't have to hide it. I'm here exactly for that reason."

James caught the implication immediately but was too tired to protest. Instead, he shook his head, acting as if he had no clue what they were talking about.

"James, you can be honest with me." He spoke gently, acting as if they had been close for years. He took a step forward, being sure not to mind James's eye trailing along his chest.

"Mh-mh."

"All I ask of you is to be straightforward, okay?" He was now standing at the feet of the couch, arms crossed.

James didn't answer once again, instead, he got up and started nervously roaming the room to escape Joseph's slightly confrontational tone. Joseph tilted his head, chuckling softly to himself.

 _'Stop playing all these games. You're my husband, sure. We'll see how much that actually means when_ _I have to force you to come to terms with your own orientation.'_

The taller man promptly followed him around, avoiding the broken glass on the floor and the cardboard leaning against the walls as best as he could. He was even faster than James, outpacing him almost immediately. Their game of tag quickly devolved into them chasing each other in the living room, but occasionally moving to other rooms as well. They were now frantically trying to avoid each other, Joseph running around trying to apprehend James, who had found himself trapped in the corner of the hallway between his bathroom and bedroom.

Pressed against the wall, he was breathing heavily. A playful smirk that Joseph had never seen before was now dancing on James's lips. He planted the palms of his hands against the wall, facing Joseph directly, who was now approaching him step by step.

"When are you going to stop being evasive and give a straight answer to my face?"

"I don't have anything you need to know about."

"Don't bother hiding it, everyone knows already." Joseph's figure dwarfed James's by an impressive amount. He placed his arms on the sides of the wall, closing every escape that James could consider to avoid the conversation. His chest pressed lightly against the other man's, who had been looking down in shame since he'd found himself trapped.

"...you're lying." He whined in a shaky breath.

"You know I'm being honest with you." He applied more pressure, forcing James to retreat further in the corner. "I could crush your chest if I wanted to." He added, his voice substantially sharper than the previous.

"...please. Don't." His eyes pleaded to Joseph's.

"Say it."

"No..."

"Say it." He repeated, getting closer to his ear, mockingly chanting the words.

James exhaled, defeated.

"I'm gay."


	3. Subversion and Coexistence

Following his confession, James had spent the rest of the evening sulking with his head buried under his pillow. He hadn't dared to talk again to Joseph yet. Confused, embarrassed, and seething, he now hunched over his computer scrolling mindlessly a thread on /lgbt/. He was contemplating suing him to the authorities of the Party for attempted sexual assault, but being affiliated with a sex-offender —and even worse, a faggot— would have certainly put him under some Party observation program.

He could hear the other pacing irregularly in a neighbouring room, certainly unsure on how to approach James when they would eventually have to face each other again. Much to James's dismay, the couch in the living room wouldn't be sufficiently wide to accommodate all 190 centimetres of Joseph. That only left few other options, and he had a feeling he knew how that was going to end.

Nonetheless, he was willing not to let his emotions dominate him. Straightening his back, he shut his laptop with seeping nervousness.

A smell captivated his senses, not long after he had stretched himself to get rid of the aching of his shoulders. A warm, cosy smell of toasted bread and butter lured him out of his room and into the kitchen.

A sizzling noise greeted him once he stepped in, along with Joseph's eternally impenetrable smile. His hands were busy gripping the handles of a cast iron pan and a mysterious pot simmering in unison with the noise coming from the pan. A carefully laid stack of warm buttered toast on a plate was waiting for him on the counter. Next to it, a steaming bowl of a reddish soup. 

James stood leaning against the fridge as he watched Joseph finish toasting the remaining slices of bread, placing them to his side once they were done. He then moved the pan over to the sink, letting the cold water run over the surface coated in leftover butter. He rolled up his sleeves and began scrubbing vigorously with one of James' clean dish sponges.

The quiet of that mundane moment was extremely enjoyable to James. Not to mention that he'd now made it a habit to take a peek at every inch of skin that Joseph would allow himself to expose. James was reminded of how strong, and how powerful Joseph's muscles looked even that ordinary situation.

James pushed himself forward, now standing directly behind Joseph. He held his breath, unsure on whether to place his hand on the other's shoulder. Now that he was even closer it all seemed so easy. So easy. He touched the other's arm, lingering once he felt the warmth of Joseph's skin, who had turned his head to face James with an amused smile.

Fuck, that made everything so much harder for James.

He kissed Joseph, and at that moment that was all he thought he'd ever wanted. No white ethnostate, no tradcath utopia, hell, not even a future for his white children.

Just the feeling of another man's lips pressing against his. 


End file.
